MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Santiago seeks to build a cultural avenue like those in Buenos Aires or Madrid

“The goal is to propose a very broad range of activities and to ease public access,” explained the executive director of the Centro Arte Alameda, Roser Fort

More than fifty institutions and cultural centers located around Santiago's main avenue agreed on Tuesday to expand their cooperation and coordinate their programming to turn that historic thoroughfare into a cultural hub, similar to those in other capitals such as Buenos Aires or Madrid. Museums, theaters, libraries, cinemas and universities created the Red Alameda Cultural, a platform on which they will publish all their activities to enliven the corridor and offer citizens a complete cultural experience.

“In a world and a city so fragmented and individualistic, this space of convergence and cooperation is good news,” the regional governor of Santiago, Claudio Orrego, said at the launch, noting that the initiative gathers the cultural offerings of the entire Alameda onto a single platform. The network brings together 52 institutions, among them the Gabriela Mistral Cultural Center (GAM), the La Moneda Cultural Center, the National Cinematheque, the Chilean Museum of Pre-Columbian Art, the National Museum of Fine Arts, the Violeta Parra Museum and the Chilean National Theater.

Popularly known as La Alameda, the Avenida Libertador General Bernardo O'Higgins crosses Santiago from east to west along more than seven kilometers and has witnessed the country's main events, such as the victory of the “No” in the plebiscite that marked the beginning of the end of the dictatorship, the 2015 and 2016 Copa América, and the 2019 social uprising. The network seeks to follow the path of New York's Museum Mile, Berlin's Museum Island, São Paulo's Avenida Paulista and Buenos Aires's Arts District, and also to boost commerce, gastronomy and services in the surrounding areas.

“The goal is to propose a very broad range of activities and to ease public access,” explained the executive director of the Centro Arte Alameda, Roser Fort. “Hopefully it will make us one of the most important cultural corridors in Latin America,” added Gabriel Hoecker, of the La Moneda Cultural Center.

The launch coincides with the controversy over the austerity policy of José Antonio Kast's new government. The Ministry of Cultures, Arts and Heritage is the department facing the largest cut —around 10% of its budget— which has caused unease in the arts world. The network also emerges a few weeks after the government canceled the expansion works of the GAM, considered the country's main cultural center, citing fiscal tightness. “Culture is not a consumer good, it is a citizens' right. Cities that promote, care for and protect it are better cities,” Orrego concluded.